The publication by a small group of “Left Communists”
of their journal, Kommunist (No. 1, April 20, 1918), and of
their “theses”, strikingly confirms my views expressed in the pamphlet The Immediate
Tasks of the Soviet Government. There could not be better
confirmation, in political literature, of the utter naïvete of the
defence of petty-bourgeois sloppiness that is sometimes concealed by
“Left” slogans. It is useful and necessary to deal with the arguments
of “Left Communists” because they are characteristic of the period we
are passing through. They show up with exceptional clarity the negative
side of the “core” of this period. They are instructive, because the
people we are dealing with are the best of those who have failed to
understand the present period, people who by their knowledge and
loyalty stand far, far above the ordinary representatives of
the same mistaken views, namely, the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries.

I

As a political magnitude, or as a group claiming to play a
political role, the “Left Communist” group has presented its “Theses on
the Present Situation”. It is a good Marxist custom to give a coherent
and complete exposition of the principles underlying one’s views and
tactics. And this good Marxist custom has helped to reveal the mistake
committed by our “Lefts”, because the mere attempt to argue and not to
declaim exposes the unsoundness of their argument.

The first thing that strikes one is the abundance of allusions,
hints and evasions with regard to the old question of whether it was
right to conclude the Brest Treaty. The “Lefts” dare not put the
question in a straightforward manner. They flounder about in a comical
fashion, pile argument on argument, fish for reasons, plead that “on
the one hand” it may be so, but “on the other hand” it may not, their
thoughts wander over all and sundry subjects, they try all the time not
to see that they are defeating themselves. The “Lefts” are very careful
to quote the figures: twelve votes at the Party Congress against peace,
twenty-eight votes in favour, but they discreetly refrain from
mentioning that of the hundreds of votes cast at the meeting of the
Bolshevik group of the Congress of Soviets they obtained less than
one-tenth. They have invented a “theory” that the peace was carried by
“the exhausted and declassed elements”, while it was opposed by “the
workers and peasants of the southern regions, where there was greater
vitality in economic life and the supply of bread was more assured”. .
. . Can one do anything but laugh at this? There is not a word about
the voting at the All-Ukraine Congress of Soviets in favour of peace,
nor about the social and class character of the typically
petty-bourgeois and declassed political conglomeration in Russia who
were opposed to peace (the Left Socialist-Revolutionary party). In an
utterly childish manner, by means of amusing “scientific” explanations,
they try to conceal their own bankruptcy, to conceal the facts, the
mere review of which would show that it was precisely the declassed,
intellectual “cream” of the party, the elite, who opposed the peace
with slogans couched in revolutionary petty-bourgeois phrases, that it
was precisely the mass of workers and exploited peasants who
carried the peace.

Nevertheless, in spite of all the above-mentioned declarations and
evasions of the “Lefts” on the question of war and peace, the plain and
obvious truth manages to come to light. The authors of the theses are
compelled to admit that “the conclusion of peace has for the time being
weakened the imperialists’ attempts to make a deal on a world scale”
(this is inaccurately formulated by the “Lefts”, but this is not the
place to deal with inaccuracies). “The conclusion of peace has already
caused the conflict between the imperialist powers to become more
acute.”

Now this is a fact. Here is something that has decisive
significance. That is why those who opposed the conclusion of peace
were unwittingly playthings in the hands of the imperialists and fell
into the trap laid for them by the imperialists. For, until the world
socialist revolution breaks out, until it embraces several countries
and is strong enough to overcome international imperialism,
it is the direct duty of the socialists who have conquered in one
country (especially a backward one) not to accept battle against the
giants of imperialism. Their duty is to try to avoid battle, to wait
until the conflicts between the imperialists weaken them even more,
and bring the revolution in other countries even nearer. Our “Lefts”
did not understand this simple truth in January, February and March.
Even now they are afraid of admitting it openly. But it comes to light
through all their confused reasoning like “on the one hand it must be
confessed, on the other hand one must admit”.

“During the coming spring and summer,” the “Lefts” write in their
theses, “the collapse of the imperialist system must begin. In the
event of a victory for German imperialism in the present phase of the
war this collapse can only be postponed, but it will then express
itself in even more acute forms.”

This formulation is even more childishly inaccurate despite its
playing at science. It is natural for children to “understand” science
to mean something that can determine in what year, spring, summer,
autumn or winter the “collapse must begin”.

These are ridiculous, vain attempts to ascertain what cannot be
ascertained. No serious politician will ever say when this or
that collapse of a “system” “must begin” (the more so that the collapse
of the system has already begun, and it is now a question of
the moment when the outbreak of revolution in particular
countries will begin). But an indisputable truth forces its way through
this childishly helpless formulation, namely, the outbreaks of
revolution in other, more advanced, countries are nearer now,
a month since the beginning of the “respite” which followed the
conclusion of peace, than they were a month or six weeks ago.

What follows?

It follows that the peace supporters were absolutely right, and
their stand has been justified by the course of events. They were right
in having drummed into the minds of the lovers of ostentation that one
must be able to calculate the balance of forces and not help
the imperialists by making the battle against socialism easier for them
when socialism is still weak, and when the chances of the battle are
manifestly against socialism.

Our “Left” Communists, however, who are also fond of calling
themselves “proletarian” Communists, because there is very little that
is proletarian about them and very much that is petty-bourgeois, are
incapable of giving thought to the balance of forces, to calculating
it. This is the core of Marxism and Marxist tactics, but they
disdainfully brush aside the “core” with “proud” phrases such as:

“. . . That the masses have become firmly imbued with an inactive *&8216;peace mentality’
is an objective fact of the political situation. . . .”

What a gem! After three years of the most agonising and reactionary
war, the people, thanks to Soviet power and its correct tactics, which
never lapsed into mere phrase-making, have obtained a very, very brief,
insecure and far from sufficient respite. The “Left” intellectual
striplings, however, with the magnificence of a self-infatuated
Narcissus, profoundly declare “that the masses [???] have become firmly
imbued [!!!] with an inactive [!!!???] peace mentality”. Was I not
right when I said at the Party Congress that the paper or journal of
the “Lefts” ought to have been called not Kommunist but Szlachcic.[Szlachcic—a Polish nobleman —Ed.]

Can a Communist with the slightest understanding of the mentality
and the conditions of life of the toiling and exploited people descend
to the point of view of the typical declassed petty-bourgeois
intellectual with the mental outlook of a noble or szlachcic,
which declares that a “peace mentality” is “inactive” and believes that
the brandishing of a cardboard sword is “activity"? For our “Lefts”
merely brandish a cardboard sword when they ignore the universally
known fact, of which the war in the Ukraine has served as an additional
proof, that peoples utterly exhausted by three years of butchery cannot
go on fighting without a respite; and that war, if it cannot be
organised on a national scale, very often creates a mentality of
disintegration peculiar to petty proprietors, instead of the iron
discipline of the proletariat. Every page of Kommunist shows
that our “Lefts” have no idea of iron proletarian discipline and how it
is achieved, that they are thoroughly imbued with the mentality of the
declassed petty-bourgeois intellectual.

II

Perhaps all these phrases of the “Lefts” about war can be put down
to mere childish exuberance, which, moreover, concerns the past, and
therefore has not a shadow of political significance? This is the
argument some people put up in defence of our “Lefts”. But this is
wrong. Anyone aspiring to political leadership must be able to think
out political problems, and lack of this ability converts the “Lefts”
into spineless preachers of a policy of vacillation, which objectively
can have only one result, namely, by their vacillation the “Lefts” are
helping the imperialists to provoke the Russian Soviet Republic
into a battle that will obviously be to its disadvantage, they are
helping the imperialists to draw us into a snare. Listen to this:

“. . . The Russian workers’ revolution cannot *&8216;save itself’ by
abandoning the path of world revolution, by continually avoiding battle
and yielding to the pressure of international capital, by making
concessions to ’home capital’.

“From this point of view it is necessary to adopt a determined
class international policy which will unite international revolutionary
propaganda by word and deed, and to strengthen the organic connection
with international socialism (and not with the international
bourgeoisie). . . .”

I shall deal separately with the thrusts at home policy contained
in this passage. But examine this riot of phrase-making—and timidity in
deeds—in the sphere of foreign policy. What tactics are binding
at the present time on all who do not wish to be tools of
imperialist provocation, and who do not wish to walk into the snare?
Every politician must give a clear, straightforward reply to this
question. Our Party’s reply is well known. At the present
moment we must retreat and avoid battle. Our “Lefts” dare not
contradict this and shoot into the air: “A determined class
international policy"!!

This is deceiving the people. If you want to fight now, say so
openly. If you don’t wish to retreat now, say so openly.
Otherwise, in your objective role, you are a tool of imperialist
provocation. And your subjective “mentality” is that of a frenzied
petty bourgeois who swaggers and blusters but senses perfectly well
that the proletarian is right in retreating and in trying to
retreat in an organised way. He senses that the proletarian is right in
arguing that because we lack strength we must retreat (before Western
and Eastern imperialism) even as far as the Urals, for in this lies the
only chance of playing for time while the revolution in the
West matures, the revolution which is not “bound” (despite the twaddle
of the “Lefts") to begin in “spring or summer”, but which is coming
nearer and becoming more probable every month.

The “Lefts” have no policy of their “own”. They dare not
declare that retreat at the present moment is unnecessary. They twist
and turn, play with words, substitute the question of “continuously”
avoiding battle for the question of avoiding battle at the present
moment. They blow soap bubbles such as “international
revolutionary propaganda by deed"!! What does this mean?

It can only mean one of two things: either it is mere Nozdryovism,[1] or it
means an offensive war to overthrow international imperialism. Such
nonsense cannot be uttered openly, and that is why the “Left”
Communists are obliged to take refuge from the derision of every
politically conscious proletarian behind high-sounding and empty
phrases. They hope the inattentive reader will not notice the real
meaning of the phrase “international revolutionary propaganda by deed”.

The flaunting of high-sounding phrases is characteristic of the
declassed petty-bourgeois intellectuals. The organised proletarian
Communists will certainly punish this “habit” with nothing less than
derision and expulsion from all responsible posts. The people must be
told the bitter truth simply, clearly and in a straightforward manner:
it is possible, and even probable, that the war party will again get
the upper hand in Germany (that is, an offensive against us will
commence at once), and that Germany together with Japan, by official
agreement or by tacit understanding, will partition and strangle us.
Our tactics, if we do not want to listen to the ranters, must be to
wait, procrastinate, avoid battle and retreat. If we shake off the
ranters and “brace ourselves” by creating genuinely iron, genuinely
proletarian, genuinely communist discipline, we shall have a good
chance of gaining many months. And then by retreating even, if the
worst comes to the worst, to the Urals, we shall make it easier
for our ally (the international proletariat) to come to our aid, to
“catch up” (to use the language of sport) the distance between the
beginning of revolutionary outbreaks and revolution.

These, and these alone, are the tactics which can in fact
strengthen the connection between one temporarily isolated section of
international socialism and the other sections. But to tell the truth,
all that your arguments lead to, dear “Left Communists”, is the
“strengthening of the organic connection” between one high-sounding
phrase and another. A bad sort of “organic
connection”, this!

I shall enlighten you, my amiable friends, as to why such disaster
overtook you. It is because you devote more effort to learning by heart
and committing to memory revolutionary slogans than to thinking them
out. This leads you to write “the defence of the socialist fatherland”
in quotation marks, which are probably meant to signify your attempts
at being ironical, but which really prove that you are muddleheads. You
are accustomed to regard “defencism” as something base and despicable;
you have learned this and committed it to memory. You have learned this
by heart so thoroughly that some of you have begun talking nonsense to
the effect that defence of the fatherland in an imperialist epoch
is impermissible
(as a matter of fact, it is impermissible only in an imperialist,
reactionary war, waged by the bourgeoisie). But you have not thought
out why and when “defencism” is abominable.

To recognise defence of the fatherland means recognising the
legitimacy and justice of war. Legitimacy and justice from what point
of view? Only from the point of view of the socialist, proletariat and
its struggle for its emancipation. We do not recognise any other point
of view. If war is waged by the exploiting class with the object of
strengthening its rule as a class, such a war is a criminal
war, and “defencism” in such a war is a base betrayal of socialism. If
war is waged by the proletariat after it has conquered the bourgeoisie
in its own country, and is waged with the object of strengthening and
developing socialism, such a war is legitimate and “holy”.

We have been “defencists” since October 20, 1917. I have
said this more than once very definitely, and you dare not deny this.
It is precisely in the interests of “strengthening the connection” with
international socialism that we are in duty bound to defend
our socialist fatherland. Those who treat frivolously the
defence of the country in which the proletariat has already achieved
victory are the ones who destroy the connection with international
socialism. When we were the representatives of an oppressed class we
did not adopt a frivolous attitude towards defence of the fatherland in
an imperialist war. We opposed such defence on principle. Now that we
have become representatives of the ruling class, which has begun to
organise socialism, we demand that everybody adopt a serious
attitude towards defence of the country. And adopting a serious
attitude towards defence of the country means thoroughly preparing for
it, and strictly calculating the balance of forces. If our forces are
obviously small, the best means of defense is retreat into the
interior of the country (anyone who regards this as an artificial
formula, made up to suit the needs of the moment, should read old
Clausewitz, one of the greatest authorities on military matters,
concerning the lessons of history to be learned in this connection).
The “Left Communists”, however, do not give the slightest indication
that they understand the significance of the question of the balance of
forces.

When we were opposed to defencism on principle we were justified in
holding up to ridicule those who wanted to “save” their fatherland,
ostensibly in the interests of socialism. When we gained the right to
be proletarian defencists the whole question was radically altered. It
has become our duty to calculate with the utmost accuracy the different
forces involved, to weigh with the utmost care the chances of our ally
(the international proletariat) being able to come to our aid in time.
It is in the interest of capital to destroy its enemy (the
revolutionary proletariat) bit by bit, before the workers in all
countries have united (actually united, i.e., by beginning the
revolution). It is in our interest to do all that is possible, to take
advantage of the slightest opportunity to postpone the decisive battle
until the moment (or until after the moment) the
revolutionary workers’ contingents have united in a single great
international army.

III

We shall pass on to the misfortunes of our “Left” Communists in the
sphere of home policy. It is difficult to read the following phrases in
the theses on the present situation without smiling.

“. . . The systematic use of the remaining means of production is
conceivable only if a most determined policy of socialisation is
pursued” . . . “not to capitulate to the bourgeoisie and its
petty-bourgeois intellectualist servitors, but to rout the bourgeoisie
and to put down sabotage completely. . . .”

Dear “Left Communists”, how determined they are, but how little
thinking they display. What do they mean by pursuing “a most determined
policy of socialisation"?

One may or may not be determined on the question of nationalisation
or confiscation, but the whole point is that even the greatest possible
“determination” in the world is not enough to pass from
nationalisation and confiscation to socialisation. The
misfortune of our “Lefts” is that by their naïve, childish
combination of the words “most determined policy of socialisation” they
reveal their utter failure to understand the crux of the question, the
crux of the “present” situation. The misfortune of our “Lefts” is that
they have missed the very essence of the “present situation”, the
transition from confiscation (the carrying out of which requires above
all determination in a politician) to socialisation (the carrying out
of which requires a different quality in the revolutionary).

Yesterday, the main task of the moment was, as determinedly as
possible, to nationalise, confiscate, beat down and crush the
bourgeoisie, and put down sabotage. Today, only a blind man could fail
to see that we have nationalised, confiscated, beaten down and put down
more than we have had time to count. The difference between
socialisation and simple confiscation is that confiscation can be
carried out by “determination” alone, without the ability to calculate
and distribute properly, whereas socialisation cannot be brought
about without this ability.

The historical service we have rendered is that yesterday we were
determined (and we shall be tomorrow) in confiscating, in beating down
the bourgeoisie, in putting down sabotage. To write about this today in
“theses on the present situation” is to fix one’s eyes on the past and
to fail to understand the transition to the future.

“. . . To put down sabotage completely. . . .” What a task they
have found! Our saboteurs are quite sufficiently “put down”. What we
lack is something quite different. We lack the proper calculation
of which saboteurs to set to work and where to place them. We lack the
organisation of our own forces that is needed for, say, one Bolshevik
leader or controller to be able to supervise a hundred saboteurs who
are now coming into our service. When that is how matters stand, to
flaunt such phrases as “a most determined policy of socialisation”,
“routing”, and “completely putting down” is just missing the mark. It
is typical of the petty-bourgeois revolutionary not to notice that
routing, putting down, etc., is not enough for socialism. It is
sufficient for a small proprietor enraged against a big proprietor. But
no proletarian revolutionary would ever fall into such error.

If the words we have quoted provoke a smile, the following
discovery made by the “Left Communists” will provoke nothing short of
Homeric laughter. According to them, under the “Bolshevik deviation to
the right” the Soviet Republic is threatened with “evolution towards
state capitalism”. They have really frightened us this time! And with
what gusto these “Left Communists” repeat this threatening revelation
in their theses and articles. . . .

It has not occurred to them that state capitalism would be a step
forward as compared with the present state of affairs in our
Soviet Republic. If in approximately six months’ time state capitalism
became established in our Republic, this would be a great success and a
sure guarantee that within a year socialism will have gained a
permanently firm hold and will have become invincible in our country.

I can imagine with what noble indignation a “Left Communist” will
recoil from these words, and what “devastating criticism” he will make
to the workers against the “Bolshevik deviation to the right”. What!
Transition to state capitalism in the Soviet Socialist
Republic would be a step forward?. . . Isn’t this the betrayal of
socialism?

Here we come to the root of the economic mistake of the
“Left Communists”. And that is why we must deal with this point in
greater detail.

Firstly, the “Left Communists” do not understand what kind of transition
it is from capitalism to socialism that gives us the right and the
grounds to call our country the Socialist Republic of Soviets.

Secondly, they reveal their petty-bourgeois mentality precisely by not
recognising the petty-bourgeois element as the principal
enemy of socialism in our country.

Thirdly, in making a bugbear of “state capitalism”, they betray
their failure to understand that the Soviet state differs from the
bourgeois state economically.

Let us examine these three points.

No one, I think, in studying the question of the economic system of
Russia, has denied its transitional character. Nor, I think, has any
Communist denied that the term Socialist Soviet Republic implies the
determination of Soviet power to achieve the transition to socialism,
and not that the new economic system is recognised as a socialist
order.

But what does the word “transition” mean? Does it not mean, as
applied to an economy, that the present system contains elements,
particles, fragments of both capitalism and socialism?
Everyone will admit that it does. But not all who admit this take the
trouble to consider what elements actually constitute the various
socio-economic structures that exist in Russia at the present time. And
this is the crux of the question.

2) small commodity production (this includes the
majority of those peasants who sell their grain);

3) private capitalism;

4) state capitalism;

5) socialism.

Russia is so vast and so varied that all these different types of
socio-economic structures are intermingled. This is what constitutes
the specific features of the situation.

The question arises: what elements predominate? Clearly in a
small-peasant country, the petty-bourgeois element predominates and it
must predominate, for the great majority of those working the land are
small commodity producers. The shell of our state capitalism (grain
monopoly, state controlled entrepreneurs and traders, bourgeois
co-operators) is pierced now in one place, now in another by profiteers,
the chief object of profiteering being grain.

It is in this field that the main struggle is being waged. Between
what elements is this struggle being waged if we are to speak in terms
of economic categories such as “state capitalism"? Between the fourth
and the fifth in the order in which I have just enumerated them. Of
course not. It is not state capitalism that is at war with socialism,
but the petty bourgeoisie plus private capitalism fighting together
against both state capitalism and socialism. The petty bourgeoisie
oppose every kind of state interference, accounting and
control, whether it be state capitalist or state socialist. This is an
absolutely unquestionable fact of reality, and the root of the economic
mistake of the “Left Communists” is that they have failed to understand
it. The profiteer, the commercial racketeer, the disrupter of
monopoly—these are our principal “internal” enemies, the enemies of the
economic measures of Soviet power. A hundred and twenty-five years ago
it might have been excusable for the French petty bourgeoisie, the most
ardent and sincere revolutionaries, to try to crush the profiteer by
executing a few of the “chosen” and by making thunderous declamations.
Today, however, the purely rhetorical attitude to this question assumed
by some Left Socialist-Revolutionaries can rouse nothing but disgust
and revulsion in every politically conscious revolutionary. We know
perfectly well that the economic basis of profiteering is both the
small proprietors, who are exceptionally widespread in Russia, and
private capitalism, of which every petty bourgeois is an
agent. We know that the million tentacles of this petty-bourgeois hydra
now and again encircle various sections of the workers, that, instead
of state monopoly, profiteering forces its way into every pore of
our social and economic organism.

Those who fail to see this show by their blindness that they are
slaves of petty-bourgeois prejudices. This is precisely the case with
our “Left Communists”, who in words (and of course in their deepest
convictions) are merciless enemies of the petty bourgeoisie, while in
deeds they help only the petty bourgeoisie, serve only this section of
the population and express only its point of view by fighting—in
April 1918!!—against . . . “state capitalism”. They are wide of
the mark!

The petty bourgeoisie have money put away, the few thousand that
they made during the war by “honest” and especially by dishonest means.
They are the characteristic economic type that serves as the basis of
profiteering and private capitalism. Money is a certificate entitling
the possessor to receive social wealth; and a vast section of small
proprietors, numbering millions, cling to this certificate and conceal
it from the “state”. They do not believe in socialism or communism, and
“mark time” until the proletarian storm blows over. Either we
subordinate the petty bourgeoisie to our control and
accounting (we can do this if we organise the poor, that is, the
majority of the population or semi-proletarians, around the politically
conscious proletarian vanguard), or they will overthrow our workers’
power as surely and as inevitably as the revolution was overthrown by
the Napoleons and Cavaignacs who sprang from this very soil of petty
proprietorship. This is how the question stands. Only the Left
Socialist Revolutionaries fail to see this plain and evident truth
through their mist of empty phrases about the “toiling” peasants. But
who takes these phrase-mongering Left Socialist-Revolutionaries
seriously?

The petty bourgeois who hoards his thousands is an enemy of state
capitalism. He wants to employ his thousands just for himself, against
the poor, in opposition to any kind of state control. And the sum total
of these thousands, amounting to many thousands of millions, forms the
base for profiteering, which undermines our socialist construction. Let
us assume that a certain number of workers produce in a few days values
equal to 1,000. Let us then assume that 200 of this total vanishes
owing to petty profiteering, various kinds of embezzlement and the
“evasion” by the small proprietors of Soviet decrees and regulations.
Every politically conscious worker will say that if better order and
organisation could be obtained at the price of 300 out of the 1,000 he
would willingly give 300 instead of 200, for it will be quite easy
under Soviet power to reduce this “tribute” later on to, say, 100 or
50, once order and organisation are established and once the
petty-bourgeois disruption of state monopoly is completely overcome.

This simple illustration in figures, which I have deliberately
simplified to the utmost in order to make it absolutely clear, explains
the present correlation of state capitalism and socialism.
The workers hold state power and have every legal opportunity of
“taking” the whole thousand, without giving up a single kopek, except
for socialist purposes. This legal opportunity, which rests upon the
actual transition of power to the workers, is an element of socialism.

But in many ways, the small proprietary and private capitalist
element undermines this legal position, drags in profiteering, hinders
the execution of Soviet decrees. State capitalism would be a gigantic
step forward even if we paid more than we are
paying at present (I took a numerical example deliberately to bring
this out more sharply), because it is worth while paying for “tuition”,
because it is useful for the workers, because victory over disorder,
economic ruin and laxity is the most important thing; because the
continuation of the anarchy of small ownership is the greatest, the
most serious danger, and it will certainly be our ruin
(unless we overcome it), whereas not only will the payment of a heavier
tribute to state capitalism not ruin us, it will lead us to socialism
by the surest road. When the working class has learned how to defend
the state system against the anarchy of small ownership, when it has
learned to organise large-scale production on a national scale, along
state capitalist lines, it will hold, if I may use the expression, all
the trump cards, and the consolidation of socialism will be assured.

In the first place, economically, state capitalism is
immeasurably superior to our present economic system.

In the second place, there is nothing terrible in it for Soviet
power, for the Soviet state is a state in which the power of the
workers and the poor is assured. The “Left Communists” failed to
understand these unquestionable truths, which, of course, a “Left
Socialist-Revolutionary”, who cannot connect any ideas on political
economy in his head in general, will never understand, but which every
Marxist must admit. It is not even worth while arguing with a
Left Socialist-Revolutionary. It is enough to point to him as a
“repulsive example” of a windbag. But the “Left Communists” must be
argued with because it is Marxists who are making a mistake, and an
analysis of their mistake will help the working class to find
the true road.

IV

To make things even clearer, let us first of all take the most
concrete example of state capitalism. Everybody knows what this example
is. It is Germany. Here we have “the last word” in modern large-scale
capitalist engineering and planned organisation, subordinated to
Junker-bourgeois imperialism. Cross out the words in italics, and
in place of the militarist, Junker, bourgeois, imperialist state
put also a state, but of a different social type, of a
different class content—a Soviet state, that is, a
proletarian state, and you will have the sum total of the
conditions necessary for socialism.

Socialism is inconceivable without large-scale capitalist
engineering based on the latest discoveries of modern science. It is
inconceivable without planned state organisation, which keeps tens of
millions of people to the strictest observance of a unified standard in
production and distribution. We Marxists have always spoken of this,
and it is not worth while wasting two seconds talking to people who do
not understand even this (anarchists and a good half of the
Left Socialist-Revolutionaries).

At the same time socialism is inconceivable unless the proletariat
is the ruler of the state. This also is ABC. And history (which nobody,
except Menshevik blockheads of the first order, ever expected to bring
about “complete” socialism smoothly, gently, easily and simply) has
taken such a peculiar course that it has given birth in 1918
to two unconnected halves of socialism existing side by side like two
future chickens in the single shell of international imperialism. In
1918 Germany and Russia have become the most striking embodiment of the
material realisation of the economic, the productive and the
socio-economic conditions for socialism, on the one hand, and the
political conditions, on the other.

A successful proletarian revolution in Germany would immediately
and very easily smash any shell of imperialism (which unfortunately is
made of the best steel, and hence cannot be broken by the efforts of any
. . . chicken) and would bring about the victory of world socialism for
certain, without any difficulty, or with slight difficulty—if, of
course, by “difficulty” we mean difficult on a world historical scale,
and not in the parochial philistine sense.

While the revolution in Germany is still slow in “coming forth”,
our task is to study the state capitalism of the Germans, to spare no
effort in copying it and not shrink from adopting dictatorial
methods to hasten the copying of it. Our task is to hasten this copying
even more than Peter hastened the copying of Western culture by
barbarian Russia, and we must not hesitate to use barbarous methods in
fighting barbarism. If there are anarchists and Left
Socialist-Revolutionaries (I recall off-hand the speeches of Karelin
and Ghe at the meeting of the Central Executive Committee) who indulge
in Narcissus-like reflections and say that it is unbecoming for us
revolutionaries to “take lessons” from German imperialism, there is
only one thing we can say in reply: the revolution that took these
people seriously would perish irrevocably (and deservedly).

At present, petty-bourgeois capitalism prevails in Russia, and it
is one and the same road that leads from it to both
large-scale state capitalism and to socialism, through one
and the same intermediary station called “national accounting and
control of production and distribution”. Those who fail to understand
this are committing an unpardonable mistake in economics. Either they
do not know the facts of life, do not see what actually exists and are
unable to look the truth in the face, or they confine themselves to
abstractly comparing “capitalism” with “socialism” and fail to study
the concrete forms and stages of the transition that is taking place in
our country. Let it be said in parenthesis that this is the very
theoretical mistake which misled the best people in the Novaya
Zhizn and Vperyod camp. The worst and the mediocre of
these, owing to their stupidity and spinelessness, tag along behind the
bourgeoisie, of whom they stand in awe. The best of them have failed to
understand that it was not without reason that the teachers of
socialism spoke of a whole period of transition from capitalism to
socialism and emphasised the “prolonged birth pangs” of the new
society. And this new society is again an abstraction which can come
into being only by passing
through a series of varied, imperfect concrete attempts to create this
or that socialist state.

It is because Russia cannot advance from the economic situation now
existing here without traversing the ground which is common
to state capitalism and to socialism (national accounting and control)
that the attempt to frighten others as well as themselves with
“evolution towards state capitalism” (Kommunist No.
1, p. 8, col. 1) is utter theoretical nonsense. This is letting one’s
thoughts wander away from the true road of “evolution”, and failing to
understand what this road is. In practice, it is equivalent to pulling
us back to small proprietary capitalism.

In order to convince the reader that this is not the first time I
have given this “high” appreciation of state capitalism and that I gave
it before the Bolsheviks seized power I take the liberty of
quoting the following passage from my pamphlet The Impending
Catastrophe and How to Combat It , written in September 1917.

“. . . Try to substitute for the Junker-capitalist state, for the
landowner-capitalist state, a revolutionary-democratic state,
i.e., a state which in a revolutionary way abolishes all privileges and
does not fear to introduce the fullest democracy in a revolutionary
way. You will find that, given a really revolutionary-democratic state,
state-monopoly capitalism inevitably and unavoidably implies a step,
and more than one step, towards socialism!

“. . . For socialism is merely the next step forward from
state-capitalist monopoly.

“. . . State-monopoly capitalism is a complete material
preparation for socialism, the threshold of socialism, a rung
on the ladder of history between which and the rung called socialism there
are no intermediate rungs
” (pages 27 and 28)

Please note that this was written when Kerensky was in power, that
we are discussing not the dictatorship of the proletariat, not
the socialist state, but the “revolutionary-democratic” state. Is it
not clear that the higher we stand on this political ladder, the
more completely we incorporate the socialist state and the
dictatorship of the proletariat in the Soviets, the less
ought we to fear “state capitalism"? Is it not clear that from the material,
economic and productive point of view, we are not yet on “the
threshold” of socialism? Is it not clear that we cannot pass through
the door of socialism without crossing “the threshold” we have not yet
reached?

From whatever side we approach the question, only one conclusion
can be drawn: the argument of the “Left Communists” about the “state
capitalism” which is alleged to be threatening us is an utter mistake
in economics and is evident proof that they are complete slaves of
petty-bourgeois ideology.

V

The following is also extremely instructive.

When we argued with Comrade Bukharin in the Central Executive
Committee; see
present edition, Volume. 25, pages 358, 359.—Ed. he
declared, among other things, that on the question of high salaries for
specialists “we” (evidently meaning the “Left Communists") were “more
to the right than Lenin”, for in this case “we” saw no deviation from
principle, bearing in mind Marx’s words that under certain conditions
it is more expedient for the working class to “buy out the whole lot of
them”[2]
(namely, the whole lot of capitalists, i.e., to buy from the
bourgeoisie the land, factories, works and other means of production).

This extremely interesting statement shows, in the first place,
that Bukharin is head and shoulders above the Left
Socialist-Revolutionaries and anarchists, that he is by no means
hopelessly stuck in the mud of phrase-making, but on the contrary is
making efforts to think out the concrete difficulties of the
transition—the painful and difficult transition—from capitalism to
socialism.

In the second place, this statement makes Bukharin’s mistake still
more glaring.

Let us consider Marx’s idea carefully.

Marx was talking about the Britain of the seventies of the last
century, about the culminating point in the development of pre-monopoly
capitalism. At that time Britain was a country in which militarism and
bureaucracy were less pronounced than in any other, a country in which
there was the greatest possibility of a “peaceful” victory for
socialism in the sense of the workers “buying out” the bourgeoisie. And
Marx said that under certain conditions the workers would certainly not
refuse to buy out the bourgeoisie. Marx did not commit himself, or the
future leaders of the socialist revolution, to matters of form, to ways
and means of bringing about the revolution. He understood perfectly
well that a vast number of new problems would arise, that the whole
situation would change in the course of the revolution, and that the
situation would change radically and often in the
course of revolution.

Well, and what about Soviet Russia? Is it not clear that after
the seizure of power by the proletariat and after the
crushing of the exploiters’ armed resistance and sabotage, certain
conditions prevail which correspond to those which might have existed
in Britain half a century ago had a peaceful transition to socialism
begun there? The subordination of the capitalists to the workers in
Britain would have been assured at that time owing to the following
circumstances: (1) the absolute preponderance of workers, of
proletarians, in the population owing to the absence of a peasantry (in
Britain in the seventies there was hope of an extremely rapid spread of
socialism among agricultural labourers); (2) the excellent organisation
of the proletariat in trade unions (Britain was at that time the
leading country in the world in this respect); (3) the comparatively
high level of culture of the proletariat, which had been trained by
centuries of development of political liberty; (4) the old habit of the
well-organised British capitalists of settling political and economic
questions by compromise—at that time the British capitalists were
better organised than the capitalists of any country in the world (this
superiority has now passed to Germany). These were the circumstances
which at that time gave rise to the idea that the peaceful
subjugation of the British capitalists by the workers was possible.

In our country, at the present time, this subjugation is assured by
certain premises of fundamental significance (the victory in October
and the suppression, from October to February, of the capitalists’
armed resistance and sabotage). But instead of the absolute
preponderance of workers, of proletarians, in the population, and instead
of a high degree of organisation among them, the important factor
of victory in Russia was the support the proletarians received from the
poor peasants and those who had experienced sudden ruin. Finally, we
have neither a high degree of culture nor the habit of compromise. If
these concrete conditions are carefully considered, it will become
clear that we can and ought to employ two methods simultaneously.
On the one hand we must ruthlessly suppress[3] the uncultured capitalists
who refuse to have anything to do with “state capitalism” or to
consider any form of compromise, and who continue by means of
profiteering, by bribing the poor peasants, etc., to hinder the
realisation of the measures taken by the Soviets. On the other hand, we
must use the method of compromise, or of buying off the
cultured capitalists who agree to “state capitalism”, who are capable
of putting it into practice and who are useful to the proletariat as
intelligent and experienced organisers of the largest types
of enterprises, which actually supply products to tens of millions of
people.

Bukharin is an extremely well-read Marxist economist. He therefore
remembered that Marx was profoundly right when he taught the workers
the importance of preserving the organisation of large-scale
production, precisely for the purpose of facilitating the transition to
socialism. Marx taught that (as an exception, and Britain was then an
exception) the idea was conceivable of paying the capitalists well,
of buying them off, if the circumstances were such as to
compel the capitalists to submit peacefully and to come over to
socialism in a cultured and organised fashion, provided they were paid.

But Bukharin went astray because he did not go deep enough into the
specific features of the situation in Russia at the present time—an
exceptional situation when we, the Russian proletariat, are in advance
of any Britain or any Germany as regards our political order, as
regards the strength of the workers’ political power, but are behind
the most backward West-European country as regards organising a good
state capitalism, as regards our level of culture and the degree of
material and productive preparedness for the “introduction” of
socialism. Is it not clear that the specific nature of the present
situation creates the need for a specific type of “buying out” which
the workers must offer to the most cultured, the most skilled, the most
capable organisers among the capitalists who are ready to enter the
service of Soviet power and to help honestly in organising “state”
production on the largest possible scale? Is it not clear that in this
specific situation we must make, every effort to avoid two mistakes,
both of which are of a petty-bourgeois nature? On the one hand, it
would be a fatal mistake to declare that since there is a discrepancy
between our economic “forces” and our political strength, it “follows”
that we should not have seized power.[4] Such an argument can be advanced only by a “man in a muffler”,[5] who
forgets that there will always be such a “discrepancy”, that it always
exists in the development of nature as well as in the development of
society, that only by a series of attempts—each of which, taken by
itself, will be one sided and will suffer from certain
inconsistencies—will complete socialism be created by the revolutionary
co-operation of the proletarians of all countries.

On the other hand, it would be an obvious mistake to give free rein
to ranters and phrase-mongers who allow themselves to be carried away
by the “dazzling” revolutionary spirit, but who are incapable of
sustained, thoughtful and deliberate revolutionary work which takes
into account the most difficult stages of transition.

Fortunately, the history of the development of the revolutionary
parties and of the struggle that Bolshevism waged against them has left
us aheritage
of sharply defined types, of which the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries
and anarchists are striking examples of bad revolutionaries. They are
now shouting hysterically, choking and shouting themselves hoarse,
against the “compromise” of the “Right Bolsheviks”. But they are
incapable of thinking what is bad in “compromise”, and why
“compromise” has been justly condemned by history and the course of the
revolution.

Compromise in Kerensky’s time meant the surrender of power to the
imperialist bourgeoisie, and the question of power is the fundamental
question of every revolution. Compromise by a section of the Bolsheviks
in October November 1917 either meant that they feared the proletariat
seizing power or wished to share power equally, not only with
“unreliable fellow-travellers” like the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries,
but also with the enemies, with the Chernovists and the Mensheviks. The
latter would inevitably have hindered us in fundamental matters, such
as the dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, the ruthless
suppression of the Bogayevskys, the universal setting up of the Soviet
institutions, and in every act of confiscation.

Now power has been seized, retained and consolidated in the hands
of a single party, the party of the proletariat, even without the
“unreliable fellow-travellers”. To speak of compromise at the present
time when there is no question, and can be none, of sharing power,
of renouncing the dictatorship of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie,
is merely to repeat, parrot-fashion, words which have been learned by
heart but not understood. To describe as “compromise” the fact that,
having arrived at a situation when we can and must rule the country, we
try to win over to our side, not grudging the cost, the most skilled
people capitalism has trained and to take them into our service against
small proprietary disintegration, reveals a total incapacity to think
out the economic tasks of socialist construction.

Therefore, while it is to Comrade Bukharin’s credit that on the
Central Executive Committee he “felt ashamed” of the “service” he had
been rendered by Karelin and Ghe, nevertheless, as far as the “Left
Communist” trend is concerned, the reference to their
political comrades-in-arms still remains a serious warning.

Take, for example, Znamya Truda, the organ of the Left
Socialist-Revolutionaries, of April 25, 1918, which proudly declares,
“The present position of our party coincides with that of another trend
in Bolshevism (Bukharin, Pokrovsky and others)”. Or take the Menshevik Vperyod
of the same date, which contains among other articles the following
“thesis” by the notorious Menshevik Isuv:

“The policy of Soviet power, from the very outset devoid of a
genuinely proletarian character, has lately pursued more and more
openly a course of compromise with the bourgeoisie and has assumed an
obviously anti-working class character. On the pretext of nationalising
industry, they are pursuing a policy of establishing industrial trusts,
and on the pretext of restoring the productive forces of the country,
they are attempting to abolish the eight hour day, to introduce
piece-work and the Taylor system, black lists and victimisation. This
policy threatens to deprive the proletariat of its most important
economic gains and to make it a victim of unrestricted exploitation by
the bourgeoisie.”

Isn’t it marvellous?

Kerensky’s friends, who, together with him, conducted an
imperialist war for the sake of the secret treaties, which promised
annexations to the Russian capitalists, the colleagues of Tsereteli,
who, on June 11, threatened to disarm the workers,[6] the
Lieberdans, who screened the rule of the bourgeoisie with high-sounding
phrases—these are the very people who accuse Soviet power of “compromising
with the bourgeoisie”, of “establishing trusts” (that is, of
establishing “state capitalism"!), of introducing the Taylor system.

Indeed, the Bolsheviks ought to present Isuv with a medal, and his
thesis ought to be exhibited in every workers’ club and union as an
example of the provocative speeches of the bourgeoisie. The
workers know these Lieberdans, Tseretelis and Isuvs very well now. They
know them from experience, and it would be extremely useful indeed for
the workers to think over the reason why such lackeys of the
bourgeoisie should incite the workers to resist the Taylor system
and the “establishment of trusts”.

Class-conscious workers will carefully compare the “thesis” of
Isuv, a friend of the Lieberdans and the Tseretelis, with the following
thesis of the “Left Communists”.

“The introduction of labour discipline in connection with the
restoration of capitalist management of industry cannot considerably
increase the productivity of labour, but it will diminish the class
initiative, activity and organisation of the proletariat. It threatens
to enslave the worklng class; it will rouse discontent among the
backward elements as well as among the vanguard of the proletariat. In
order to implement this system in the face of the hatred prevailing
among the proletariat against the ’capitalist saboteurs’, the Communist
Party would have to rely on the petty bourgeoisie, as against the
workers, and in this way would ruin itself as the party of the
proletariat” (Kommunist No. 1, p. 8, col. 2).

This is most striking proof that the “Lefts” have fallen into the
trap, have allowed themselves to be provoked by the Isuvs and the other
Judases of capitalism. It serves as a good lesson for the workers, who
know that it is precisely the vanguard of the proletariat which stands
for the introduction of labour discipline, and that it is precisely the
petty bourgeoisie which is doing its utmost to disrupt this discipline.
Speeches such as the thesis of the “Lefts” quoted above are a terrible
disgrace and imply the complete renunciation of communism in practice
and complete desertion to the camp of the petty bourgeoisie.

“In connection with the restoration of capitalist management"—these
are the words with which the “Left Communists” hope to “defend
themselves”. A perfectly useless defence, because, in the first place,
when putting “management” in the hands of capitalists Soviet power
appoints workers’ Commissars or workers’ committees who watch the
manager’s every step, who learn from his management experience and who
not only have the right to appeal against his orders, but can secure
his removal through the organs of Soviet power. In the second place,
“management” is entrusted to capitalists only for executive functions
while at work, the conditions of which are determined by the Soviet
power, by which they may be abolished or revised. In the third place,
“management” is entrusted by the Soviet power to capitalists not as
capitalists, but as technicians or organisers for higher salaries. And
the workers know very well that ninety-nine per cent of the organisers
and first-class technicians of really Iarge-scale and
giant enterprises, trusts or other establishments belong to the
capitalist class. But it is precisely these people whom we, the
proletarian party, must appoint to “manage” the labour process and the
organisation of production, for there are no other people who
have practical experience in this matter. The workers, having grown out
of the infancy when they could have been misled by “Left” phrases or
petty-bourgeois loose thinking, are advancing towards socialism
precisely through the capitalist management of trusts, through gigantic
machine industry, through enterprises which have a turnover of several
millions per year—only through such a system of production and such
enterprises. The workers are not petty bourgeois. They are not afraid
of large-scale “state capitalism”, they prize it as their proletarian
weapon which their Soviet power will use against small
proprietary disintegration and disorganisation.

This is incomprehensible only to the declassed and consequently
thoroughly petty-bourgeois intelligentsia, typified among the “Left
Communists” by Osinsky, when he writes in their journal:

“. . . The whole initiative in the organisation and manage ment of
any enterprise will belong to the ‘organisers of the
trusts’. We are not going to teach them, or make rank-and-file workers
out of them, we are going to learn from them” (Kommunist No.
1, p. 14, col. 2).

The attempted irony in this passage is aimed at my words “learn
socialism from the organisers of the trusts”.

Osinsky thinks this is funny. He wants to make “rank and-file
workers” out of the organisers of the trusts. If this had been written
by a man of the age of which the poet wrote “But fifteen years, not
more?. . .“[7] there
would have been nothing surprising about it. But it is somewhat strange
to hear such things from a Marxist who has learned that socialism is
impossible unless it makes use of the achievements of the engineering
and culture created-by large scale capitalism. There is no trace of
Marxism in this.

No. Only those are worthy of the name of Communists who understand
that it is impossible to create or introduce socialism without
learning from the organisers of the trusts. For socialism is not a
figment of the imagination, but the assimilation and application by the
proletarian vanguard, which has seized power, of what has been created
by the trusts. We, the party of the proletariat, have no other way
of acquiring the ability to organise large-scale production on trust
lines, as trusts are organised, except by acquiring it from first-class
capitalist experts.

We have nothing to teach them, unless we undertake the childish
task of “teaching” the bourgeois intelligentsia socialism. We must not
teach them, but expropriate them (as is being done in Russia
“determinedly” enough), put a stop to their sabotage, subordinate
them as a section or group to Soviet power. We, on the other hand, if
we are not Communists of infantile age and infantile understanding,
must learn from them, and there is something to learn, for the party of
the proletariat and its vanguard have no experience of
independent work in organising giant enterprises which serve the needs
of scores of millions of people.

The best workers in Russia have realised this. They have begun to
learn from the capitalist organisers, the managing engineers and the
technicians. They have begun to learn steadily and cautiously with easy
things, gradually passing on to the more difficult things. If things
are going more slowly in the iron and steel and engineering industries,
it is because they present greater difficulties. But the textile and
tobacco workers and tanners are not afraid of “state capitalism” or of
“learning from the organisers of the trusts”, as the declassed
petty-bourgeois intelligentsia are. These workers in the central
leading institutions like Chief Leather Committee and Central Textile
Committee take their place by the side of the capitalists, learn
from them, establish trusts, establish “state capitalism”, which
under Soviet power represents the threshold of socialism, the condition
of its firm victory.

This work of the advanced workers of Russia, together with their
work of introducing labour discipline, has begun and is proceeding
quietly, unobtrusively, without the noise and fuss so necessary to some
“Lefts”. It is proceeding very cautiously and gradually, taking into
account the lessons of practical experience. This hard work, the work
of learning practically how to build up large-scale
production, is the guarantee that we are on the right road, the
guarantee that the class-conscious workers in Russia are carrying on
the struggle against small proprietary disintegration and
disorganisation, against petty-bourgeois indiscipline[8]—the guarantee
of the victory of communism.

Two remarks in conclusion.

In arguing with the “Left Communists” on April 4, 1918 (see Kommunist
No. 1, p. 4, footnote), I put it to them bluntly: “Explain what you are
dissatisfied with in the railway decree; submit your
amendments to it. It is your duty as Soviet leaders of the proletariat
to do so, otherwise what you say is nothing but empty phrases.”

The first issue of Kommunist appeared on April 20, 1918,
but did not contain a single word about how, according to the
“Left Communists”, the railway decree should be altered or amended.

The “Left Communists” stand condemned by their own silence. They
did nothing but attack the railway decree with all sorts of
insinuations (pages 8 and 16 of No. 1), they gave no
articulate answer to the question, “How should the decree be amended if
it is wrong?”

No comment is needed. The class-conscious workers will call such
“criticism” of the railway decree (which is a typical example of our
line of action, the line of firmness, the line of dictatorship, the
line of proletarian discipline) either “Isuvian” criticism or empty
phrase-making.

Second remark. The first issue of Kommunist contained a
very flattering review by Comrade Bukharin of my pamphlet The State
and Revolution. But however much I value the opinion of people
like Bukharin, my conscience compels me to say that the character
of the review reveals a sad and significant fact. Bukharin regards the
tasks of the proletarian dictatorship from the point of view of the past
and not of the future. Bukharin noted and emphasised what the
proletarian revolutionary and the petty-bourgeois revolutionary may
have in common on the question of the state. But Bukharin “overlooked”
the very thing that distinguishes the one from the other.

Bukharin noted and emphasised that the old state machinery must be
“smashed” and “blown up”, that the bourgeoisie must be “finally and
completely strangled” and so on. The frenzied petty bourgeoisie may
also want this. And this, in the main, is what our revolution has already
done between October 1917 and February 1918.

In my pamphlet I also mention what even the most revolutionary
petty bourgeois cannot want, what the class-conscious proletarian does
want, what our revolution has not yet accomplished. On this
task, the task of tomorrow, Bukharin said nothing.

And I have all the more reason not to be silent on this point,
because, in the first place, a Communist is expected to devote greater
attention to the tasks of tomorrow, and not of yesterday, and, in the
second place, my pamphlet was written before the Bolsheviks
seized power, when it was impossible to treat the Bolsheviks to vulgar
petty-bourgeois arguments such as: “Yes, of course, after
seizing power, you begin to talk about discipline.”

“. . . Socialism will develop into communism . . . since people
will become accustomed to observing the elementary conditions of social
life without violence and without subordination.” [The
State and Revolution, pages 77-78]; thus, “elementary
conditions” were discussed before the seizure of power.)

“. . . Only then will democracy begin to wither away . . ." when “people
gradually become accustomed to observing the elementary rules of social
intercourse that have been
known for centuries and repeated for thousands of years in all
copy-book maxims; they will become accustomed to observing them without
force, without coercion, without the special apparatus for coercion
called the state” [The State and Revolution,
page 462.]; thus mention was made of “copy-book maxims” before
the seizure of power).

“. . . The higher phase of the development of communism” (from each
according to his ability, to each according to his needs) “. . .
presupposes not the present productivity of labour and not the present
ordinary run of people, who, like the seminary students in
Pomyalovsky’s stories, are capable of damaging the stocks of public
wealth just for fun, and of demanding the impossible” [The State and Revolution, pages pages 469-470.]

“Until the higher phase of communism arrives, the socialists demand
the strictest control by society and by the state over the measure of
labour and the measure of consumption . . .” (ibid.).

“Accounting and control—that is mainly what is needed for the
smooth working, for the proper functioning of the first phase of
communist society” [The State and Revolution,
page 473.] And this control must be established not only over
“the insignificant capitalist minority, over the gentry who wish to
preserve their capitalist habits”, but also over the workers who “have
been thoroughly corrupted by capitalism”[The
State and Revolution, page 474.] and over the “parasites,
the sons of the wealthy, the swindlers and other guardians of
capitalist traditions” (ibid.).

It is significant that Bukharin did not emphasise this.

Lenin
May 5, 1918

Endnotes

[1]Nozdryov—a
character in Gogol’s Dead Souls personifying the bullying
type of landowner.

[3] In this
case also we must look truth in the face. We stlll have too little of
that ruthlessness which is indispensable for the success of socialism,
and we have too little not because we lack determination. We have
sufficient determination. What we do lack is the ablllty to catch
quickly enough a sufficient number of proflteers, racketeers and
capitalists—the people who infringe the measures passed by the Soviets.
The “ability” to do this can only be acquired by establishing
accounting and control! Another thing is that the courts are not
sufficiently firm. Instead of sentencing people who take bribes to be
shot, they sentence them to six months’ imprisonment. These two defects
have the same social root: the influence of the petty-bourgeois
element, its flabbiness.

[4] Lenin has
in mind one of the basic arguments used by the Mensheviks against the
October Socialist Revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat.
The Mensheviks maintained that the seizure of power was “premature”,
that Russia had not yet achieved a high enough development of the
productive forces for socialism to be feasible. After the October
Revolution they continued to oppose Soviet power and revolutionary
socialist reforms.

These Menshevik views were summed up in a book by
N. Sukhanov, Notes on the Revolution, which Lenin criticised
in his article “Our Revolution (Appropos the Notes of N. Sukhanov)”.
Refuting the Menshevik idea that the socialist revolution in Russia was
“premature” because of economic and cultural backwardness, Lenin wrote
that the working class of Russia must begin with the winning of state
power by revolutionary means “and then, with the aid of the workers’
and peasants’ government and the Soviet system, proceed to overtake the
other nations” (Selected Works, Vol. 3, p. 822).

[5]The
Man in a Muffler—a character from the story of that title by Anton
Chekhov. Typifies the narrow-minded Philistine afraid of all innovation
and initiative.

[6] In June
1917 the Bolshevik Central Committee was planning a peaceful
demonstration by the workers and soldiers of Petrograd. At a joint
meeting of the Executive Committee of the Petrograd Soviet of Workers’
and Soldiers’ Deputies and members of the Presidium of the First
All-Russia Congress of Soviets held to discuss the matter on June 11
(24), 1917, the Menshevik I. G. Tsereteli made a viciously slanderous
statement against the Bolsheviks, accusing them of plotting against the
government and aiding the counter-revolution, and threatened to take
resolute steps to disarm the workers who supported the Bolsheviks.

[7] Lenin is
quoting V. L. Pushkin’s epigram about a mediocre poet who sent his
verses to Phoebus, god of the sun and patron of the arts. The epigram
ends with the following lines:

And while he read, the yawning Phoebus asked

What age this rhymster had attained,

How long such rumbling odes composed?

“He is fifteen,” Erato made reply.

“But fifteen years?” “No more, my lord.”

“Then shall the birch be his reward!“

[8] It is
extremely characteristic
that the authors of the theses do not say a single word ahout the
significance of the dictatorship of the prolotariat in the economic
sphere. They talk only of the “organisation” and so on. But that is
accepted also by the petty bourgeoisie, who shun dictatorship
by the workers in economic relations. A proletarian rovolutionary could
never at such a moment “forget” this core of the proletarian
revolution, which is directed against the economic foundations of
capitalism.